"Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices, and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him" Colossians 3:9&10
In an earlier blog I referenced a work titled, The Early Christians: In Their Own Words. In reading that work, I discovered countless thought-provoking, encouraging, and inspiring practices by the Christians of the first three centuries. Maybe the most interesting one surrounded the administering of one's baptism.
The candidate(their term) came to the place of water dressed in their 'everyday' clothes. Those old clothes were removed upon going down into the water. Following their death and burial(funeral) in the waters of baptism, the 'new one' came up out of the water to be literally re-dressed in a clean white robe.
This fascinates me, because I sense that the early church, like us, understood the visual of one's death and burial to sin and self in those waters; but maybe unlike us, they better understood that an 'old one' entered the water; a 'new one' exited the water. And to convey that truth, the old clothes remained "laid aside"; new clothes were "put on".
Rick Atchley has correctly said of Christians, "We are not a fixed up old jalopy...we are a brand new car!"
I have often wondered since becoming aware of this early practice, if we could bring it back?
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